Product Description
Macrauchenia is the scientific name for an extinct plant-eating mammal from South America, belonging to an extinct group of mammals called the litopterns. The best-known species is M. patachonica. In 2015, fragments of collagen were extracted from its bones and showed that its closest living relatives are the perissodactyls - horses, rhinos and tapirs.
Darwin collected thousands of plant, animal, rock and fossil specimens on the Voyage of the Beagle (1831-1836), including 13 species of fossil mammal. The latter include four different species of giant ground sloth, the remains of an extinct type of horse and two species of hoofed mammal, one of which was Macrauchenia.
M. patachonica was first described by Richard Owen based on specimens collected by Darwin. Owen noted an anatomical detail in the neck vertebrae that matched a feature unique to the camel family, and excitedly described the species as 'a giant llama'.
Both he and Darwin were struck by the apparent similarity between these extinct and living mammals of South America, and Darwin wondered whether 'one species does change into another' - thoughts that would later become solidified theories of evolution.
However, Macrauchenia feet had three toes, unlike the two-toed camels, so Owen had to abandon the llama idea. Nevertheless, the generic name that Owen chose, Macrauchenia, came from the Greek words 'macros' (long) and 'auchen' (neck), reflecting the scientific name then in use for the llama, Auchenia.
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